Hydraulic fracturing, more trouble than its worth?
Silke Mahardy, '13 | Staff Reporter
Issue date: 3/12/10 Section: Opinion
Although there is little chance of the fracking fluids migrating up from the shale beds to aquifers supplying drinking water, hundreds of cases of water contamination have been reported in other states. The sheer volume in question has the potential to contaminate aquifers and waterways from surface spills and seepage out of the open pits, as large as five acres, planned on being used to hold the wastewater, or production brine.
There is currently a hold on any permitting of hydraulic fracturing in New York while the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) reviews the draft supplement to the Generic Environmental Impact Statement for Oil and Gas drilling released last September. Safe disposal of the wastewater is one of the main issues under consideration. Each of the options have inherent threats to both the environment and the safety of drinking water. As there are very few wastewater treatment facilities currently in New York that are capable of accepting the production brine, the only other options currently remaining are trucking the fluids as far away as Ohio or holding them in underground storage wells.
As the chemicals used in hydro-fracking are currently not tested for in treatment facilities, no one knows what chemicals could be released back into the environment. The spent water also contains minerals, salts, and metals, high levels of which cannot currently be removed by existing systems. The salinity of water leaving treatment plants could create havoc in the freshwater ecosystems into which they may be released.
Complicating matters more is the radioactivity inherent in the Marcellus Shale. A recent DEC analysis of 13 samples of drilling wastewater collected in New York found 267 times the safe limit of radium-226 as determined by the federal Environmental Protection Agency. As a result, disposal of the wastewater will have to be highly monitored as will any long-term workers, both in the drilling process and those at wastewater treatment facilities.
There is currently a hold on any permitting of hydraulic fracturing in New York while the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) reviews the draft supplement to the Generic Environmental Impact Statement for Oil and Gas drilling released last September. Safe disposal of the wastewater is one of the main issues under consideration. Each of the options have inherent threats to both the environment and the safety of drinking water. As there are very few wastewater treatment facilities currently in New York that are capable of accepting the production brine, the only other options currently remaining are trucking the fluids as far away as Ohio or holding them in underground storage wells.
As the chemicals used in hydro-fracking are currently not tested for in treatment facilities, no one knows what chemicals could be released back into the environment. The spent water also contains minerals, salts, and metals, high levels of which cannot currently be removed by existing systems. The salinity of water leaving treatment plants could create havoc in the freshwater ecosystems into which they may be released.
Complicating matters more is the radioactivity inherent in the Marcellus Shale. A recent DEC analysis of 13 samples of drilling wastewater collected in New York found 267 times the safe limit of radium-226 as determined by the federal Environmental Protection Agency. As a result, disposal of the wastewater will have to be highly monitored as will any long-term workers, both in the drilling process and those at wastewater treatment facilities.